Suit: Pa. Catholic leaders failed to protect kids

The Philadelphia region is predominantly Catholic. Cardinal Justin Rigali, a named defendant in the civil suit, leads a five-county archdiocese with 1.5 million members.

Former city District Attorney Lynn Abraham, who issued the 2005 grand jury report, was among those who later lobbied lawmakers to amend the statute of limitations for child sex-abuse victims.

Her successor, Seth Williams, issued last week's charges - including two felony endangerment charges against Lynn, the first church official in the U.S. ever charged with a crime for allegedly keeping problem priests in jobs around children.

The 60-year-old Lynn, now free on bail, will fight the charges on grounds he never supervised children and cannot therefore be charged with endangering them, defense lawyer Tom Bergstrom has said.

The archdiocese had no immediate response to the lawsuit, a spokesman said.

The lawsuit, like last week's grand jury report, also lambasts victim advocates employed by the archdiocese in recent years, saying they aim to protect the archdiocese, not victims.

Monahan said his client was hounded by them to sign a confidentiality agreement in order to get needed services, including reimbursement for his medical bills. He refused to sign, the lawyer said.

Dioceses have been paying out hundreds of millions of dollars in claims since the clerical sex abuse crisis erupted in 2002. Abuse-related costs for the church since 1950 have surpassed $2 billion. Yet the Philadelphia archdiocese - led from 1988 to 2003 by Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua, trained in both church and secular law - has paid out just $200,000, Hamilton said. The archdiocesan spokesman could not immediately confirm or comment on the figure.

"The Philadelphia archdiocese has deployed and employed the hardball legal tactics of hiding behind the statute of limitations," said lawyer Jeff Anderson, who has sued dioceses around the country and is involved in the lawsuit filed Monday. "They have effectively been able to avoid any financial or public accountability - until now."